Valero Energy Corp has restored partial operations at its Port Arthur, Texas refinery after a shutdown triggered by an explosion and fire on March 23, according to people familiar with plant operations. The company has returned the 115,000-barrel-per-day AVU-147 crude distillation unit (CDU) to service, while work continues on the larger 210,000-bpd AVU-146 unit.
Inspections carried out after the March 23 incident identified a damaged tube in the heater associated with AVU-146. That finding has kept the AVU-146 production line offline while the heater tube is repaired. Valero has not responded to a request for comment about the restart or the repairs.
The Port Arthur complex has a combined nameplate capacity of 380,000 bpd. The AVU-146 CDU represents a substantial share of regional refining capability: it accounts for about 2% of crude oil refining capacity across the U.S. Gulf Coast states of Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana, a region reported to contain 9.62 million bpd in total. Within Texas alone, AVU-146's 210,000-bpd capacity is equal to 3.4% of the state's atmospheric crude distillation capacity, which totals 6.13 million bpd.
Crude distillation units operate at atmospheric pressure and perform the initial separation of crude oil into feedstocks used by downstream refinery units. The current status - one CDU operating and one remaining offline for repairs - leaves the refinery running below its full throughput capability until AVU-146 is returned to service.
There were no reported injuries tied to the explosion and fire in the refinery's diesel hydrotreater, though one individual has filed a lawsuit alleging injury after being knocked to the ground. Valero has previously declined to comment about that legal filing.
The refinery outage had an immediate price impact: diesel rose by 16 cents a barrel the day after the March 23 shutdown. Valero plans to restart AVU-146 once the damaged heater tube has been repaired and the unit is deemed ready for safe operation.
Contextual note - The sequence of events reported here is limited to operational discoveries, current repair activity and market reaction cited above. No additional timelines for the AVU-146 restart were provided by the company or the sources.